Dissertation Title: Performing Indigenous Fiesta Resistance: Velas, Muxes, and Zapotec Style

Abstract:In Performing Indigenous Fiesta Resistance: Velas, Muxes, and Zapotec Style, I investigate the role of performance, material, and visual culture in festivals known as velas (candle or vigil), which occur throughout the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Oaxaca, Mexico. I analyze the vela system to demonstrate how it enacts what I call Indigenous fiesta resistance, which theorizes how these festivals provide an opportunity for resistance by Indigenous people, women, and trans and queer communities.

Velas are multi-day fiestas composed of processions, large outdoor parties, and ceremonial dances that meld Zapotec ritual with Mexican Catholic traditions. These events function as a public forum where local identity is both constructed and contested through the performance of Zapotec style: the visual and material culture of the Isthmus Zapotec people. Using decolonial methods, my examination of the performers and producers of the local fiesta system demonstrates how women and muxes (Indigenous non-binary gender) influence the reproduction of ethnic and cultural identity in the Isthmus.

After tracing the history of Zapotec style, I examine two case studies, the Vela de San Vicente Goola and the Vela de las Intrépidas, investigating their histories, organizational structures, and local festival economies. The Vela de San Vincente, I demonstrate, enacts decolonial gestures and exemplifies the use of labor by third gender muxes. The Velas de las Intrépidas, organized by the muxes, increases acceptance of trans, queer, and other nonnormative identities by enacting public forms of plural performativity. I argue that the vela system supports contemporary forms of activism—decolonial, feminist, and trans/queer—rooted in Indigenous values and practices. My examination demonstrates how festivals can function as a dramaturgy of resistance, adding to a limited body of scholarship that examines performances at the intersection of queerness and ethnic identity.